If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Re: This Board

I believe I was invited in by Jose Slaughter. RATS was crazy at that time, and it got even worse after the exodus, going from arbitrary over-moderation to none whatsoever. I think the admins have either gotten a lot better with more experience, or maybe I've just grown up a bit. Either way, the admins are now top notch, and as a result, people who are disruptive seem to be quickly and politely dealt with. I don't post as much as I used to, now that I have kids and a career, but I always think of PD as my go-to for educated Pacers/NBA discussion.

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Eindar For This Useful Post:

Re: This Board

I somehow got here from the ESPN Pacers board a long, long time ago. I can't recall how I found it, but I imagine someone that was on here probably found me on the ESPN board and brought me over. I clearly don't post much.

01.03.01 - Burlington Coat Factory - Several forum parties from 2003-2007 took place at Briggsy's Pizza King in Castleton. Briggy's was a small building located on the outskirts of the parking lot of the nearby Burlington Coat Factory.

The summer forum party of 2004 took place on the day in which it was announced that Al Harrington had been traded to the Atlanta Hawks for Stephen Jackson.

One of the party members, a poster by the name of Tim, was well known as a very strong supporter of Harrington at that time. Ironically, prior to the trade announcement, he had already passionately explained his position on Harrington to the other party members earlier that evening. Tim appeared to be dejected after the news broke.

As the party was winding down, the remaining party members were standing outside in the parking lot to conclude the evening. When Tim finally decided to leave, he took off in his vehicle heading directly at the Burlington Coat Factory. From the point of view of the remaining party members, Tim appeared to be failing to apply the brakes on his vehicle as he drew closer and closer to the BCF.

In jest, the observers started to imply he was trying to commit suicide in his despair by yelling exclamations to Tim such as, "No!" "Don't do it!" and "Stop!" before he finally slowed down and turned parallel to the front of the BCF.

Since that time, members of Pacers Digest who understand the reference will occasionally threaten to drive into the Burlington Coat Factory if something they view as particularly unfavorable with the Pacers were to happen.

Re: This Board

Although, I'm still confused about the old Burlington Coat Factory story/joke...

Really?

OK here is the really short version. Once Upon a Time there was a poster named Tim who used to come to forum parties, he was a huge Al Harrington fan. We just so happen to have a forum party on the night that the Pacers traded Al Harrington. Although it wasn't really that long ago, no one knew about the trade until suaveness walked in and told us the pacers traded Al. Well Tim was distraught the rest of the night. (hard to believe that none of us were tuned into the trade until suave walked in, I guess smart phones weren't the same back then)

OK, so a few hours later we all get up to leave, and a few of us are outside talking in front of the Pizza King (in the parking lot) which affords a good view of the Burlington Coat Factory. Tim gets in his car and drives towards the BCF, he wasn't driving fast or anything, but from our angle it really loooked like he was going to collide into the front of the building of BCF. Obviously he turned away from the building and Tim was safe and sound. But it really did look there for a few seconds that Tim was driving right into the front entrance of the BCF - we figured he was so upset about Al being traded he must have decided life wasn't worth living.

The car wasn't speeding towards BCF, looked like Tim was so upset he didn't have the energy even to drive fast into the building.

Really you had to be there. It really was funny - really it was. And it has made for a good stories all these years.

edit, i didn't notice the version right before my post. Oh well you have two versions of it

Re: This Board

Really, the tone is set by the admins and trickles down from there. Pretty much everybody here has stepped out of line a time or to, but Hicks and crew do a pretty good job of keeping everything civil.

Heck, I've even gotten the occasional reprimand, and I'm practically perfect in every way.

If that's true, how did Sassan last so long????

Last edited by Drewtone; 02-12-2013 at 11:28 AM.

"I mean, you'd walk into our dressing room and run into Mel Daniels holding a .45 -- it makes you wonder."

The Following User Says Thank You to McKeyFan For This Useful Post:

Re: This Board

Hicks might not remember this and maybe it's a figment of my imaginiation but I remember introducing Hicks to proboards as I had just created a board on there. Anyways, I still check this board every single day even though I don't post hardly at all anymore. It's awesome to see where we were 10 years ago and where we are today.

It should be a testament to how great this board is when people like me, who haven't met anyone on here and hardly ever posts, feel like they are apart of the PD family.

The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to cramerica For This Useful Post:

Re: This Board

I started reading the STAR board during the crazy 2003 offseason which saw the re-signing of JO and Reggie, the hiring of Bird, and the trading of Brad Miller for Scot Pollard. The offseason got even more crazy when we fired Zeke and hired Carlisle, which was right around the time this board was created, IIRC. I'm proud to say that I joined at the very beginning and have been here ever since. It's without question one of the best sports message boards I've ever run across.

Re: This Board

Any thoughts on who is an active member on this board who was the or one of the earliest contributors on RATS?

I'm fairly certain that we know that Skaut_H was THE original poster at RATS. Right? Correct me if I'm wrong. I didn't start following any basketball message boards until after I'd been exiled up here for a while and I just couldn't stand the mess at RATS, but wanted to find somebody - anybody - to "talk" about the Pacers/NBA with, so Hicks started PD at just the right time for me to find it.

Why do the things that we treasure most, slip away in time
Till to the music we grow deaf, to God's beauty blind
Why do the things that connect us slowly pull us apart?
Till we fall away in our own darkness, a stranger to our own hearts
And life itself, rushing over me
Life itself, the wind in black elms,
Life itself in your heart and in your eyes, I can't make it without you

Re: This Board

I started reading the STAR board during the crazy 2003 offseason which saw the re-signing of JO and Reggie, the hiring of Bird, and the trading of Brad Miller for Scot Pollard. The offseason got even more crazy when we fired Zeke and hired Carlisle, which was right around the time this board was created, IIRC. I'm proud to say that I joined at the very beginning and have been here ever since. It's without question one of the best sports message boards I've ever run across.

I started on the STAR board about the time Harrington was drafted, I believe--a long time ago. But I imagine there are several PD members who were on STARS long before me.

"Look, it's up to me to put a team around ... Lance right now." —Kevin Pritchard press conference

Re: This Board

I joined the Indiana's Game board, which I think is what it was called at the time in very early 1994. I'm pretty sure it was March it had been around about a month before I started on it, I had been on compuserv and found out there that the Star/News were going to start a web board. Scott H or Skaut ech as I think he is called now was certainly there before me.

However I would guess that I am probably the oldest active member still left from the early star board. Owl might be in at around the same time as me or he might have been there before I'm not sure when you get to my age your memory starts to go to hell.

What's sad is that in reality up until that last year or so the star board was pretty good. We had trolls of course but generally we were able to keep them in their place. But fortunately when the board did tank big time, which it did, Hicks and Shade gave us all a newer better home.

This place is an oasis from most of the online sites in the world. I am member of a board for my chosen profession and it is filled with years and years of experience and expertise and it is also one of the worst boards I've ever been on. Childish name calling and bickering to no end.

Hicks early on set the tone that we were all going to try and be civil to one another and over the years I think the board has been just that. Early on as a member I appreciated the fact that I could criticize certain players (Jermaine O'Neal) and others weren't going to just verbally flame me without using logic and reason. Then later as a moderator myself I've tried to really uphold that ideal.

Are we perfect? No but I do think that 90+% of the time that we get it right. And by saying we I mean we as the collective not the admins.

Honestly over the years of helping out with the board, first for Hicks and now for Shade, I can say that the board really almost runs itself. On occasion we have to step in but I'm telling you the amount of both posts and traffic on here that the times we step in are very minuscule.

We honestly have some of the best posters on the internet and in my mind some of the most knowledgeable posters about both the NBA and basketball.

Proof in my mind that we are generally a civil society is that we have a couple of long tenured posters who are not even Pacers fans who call this site home. Sure they have had their run ins with some posters but if it was so miserable on them here they would have left but they are some of our biggest and best contributors on the site.

I'm not trying to just blow smoke up people's butts here, this site would not exist without all of us working together to make it happen.

Also I would be remiss without saying that we all owe Able a great deal of thanks, in fact we will never be able to repay him for what he has done (for free I might add). Thanks to Roaming Gnome one time posting photo's of Lucas Oil Stadium before it was open he drew so much traffic here that it actually crashed Able's servers. Also ask me about the time Gnome boo'd the national anthem.

Basketball isn't played with computers, spreadsheets, and simulations. ChicagoJ 4/21/13

The Following 5 Users Say Thank You to Peck For This Useful Post:

Re: This Board

By the time I started posting at Star due to getting temp booted from a non-sports forum thanks to Brawl related off-topic fight threads all of the core PD people had already left, so I didn't know about it. Some guys that were still doing both sites started pestering me to switch over, but with so many friends at Star I was reluctant and didn't feel like i could double post like that (feels redundant).

In the meantime some Star troll went over to PD using my user name and acted the fool. So someone comes to Star and asks me via PM if that's me and what's up. Of course it wasn't. By the time I made the leap the old NaptownSeth was booted, but it caused a lot of confusion because people thought I was that same poster.

And then since then, not due to that, I have gotten some wrist slaps like Anthem has. It sucks but ultimately I prefer that to non-moderation. I don't really get why people get bent out of shape over a general sense of decorum and control. There are good reasons to avoid 9 million duplicate topic threads and I'm glad PD enforces those kinds of rules.

Plus - Pictures, sigs and thread histories that aren't erased every month or so. Pet peeve at Star was someone mouthing off a ridiculous prediction and by the time it could be judged the entire thread was long gone. I like that your words can haunt you here because hopefully it makes people a bit more cautious with what they say.

Re: This Board

By the time I started posting at Star due to getting temp booted from a non-sports forum thanks to Brawl related off-topic fight threads all of the core PD people had already left, so I didn't know about it. Some guys that were still doing both sites started pestering me to switch over, but with so many friends at Star I was reluctant and didn't feel like i could double post like that (feels redundant).

In the meantime some Star troll went over to PD using my user name and acted the fool. So someone comes to Star and asks me via PM if that's me and what's up. Of course it wasn't. By the time I made the leap the old NaptownSeth was booted, but it caused a lot of confusion because people thought I was that same poster.

And then since then, not due to that, I have gotten some wrist slaps like Anthem has. It sucks but ultimately I prefer that to non-moderation. I don't really get why people get bent out of shape over a general sense of decorum and control. There are good reasons to avoid 9 million duplicate topic threads and I'm glad PD enforces those kinds of rules.

Plus - Pictures, sigs and thread histories that aren't erased every month or so. Pet peeve at Star was someone mouthing off a ridiculous prediction and by the time it could be judged the entire thread was long gone. I like that your words can haunt you here because hopefully it makes people a bit more cautious with what they say.

For the longest time I thought that the old poster was you.

Guess it shows I am kind of slow, but I only recently realized the other poster was banned and you made a refrence in another post to the other one

Re: This Board

These past history threads always bring me back to some great posters no longer here. How dare they let life intrude on their fandom.

I do wonder what happened to posters like TWES, Putnam, Spicoli, Gyron, and McClintic Sphere.

You know how hippos are made out to be sweet and silly, like big cows, but are actually extremely dangerous and can kill you with stunning brutality? The Pacers are the NBA's hippos....Matt Moore CBS Sports....

Re: This Board

Not that anyone cares, but I think I joined this board in around 2004 or 2005. I was at BSU at the time I know that. I used to be FeistyFoster but I think I got banned for something, but was able to rejoin later on. Never been to a forum party, but the stalker side of me have seen some of the members at games. Just too afraid to talk to someone, not 100% sure if it is them or not lol.

Re: This Board

Not that anyone cares, but I think I joined this board in around 2004 or 2005. I was at BSU at the time I know that. I used to be FeistyFoster but I think I got banned for something, but was able to rejoin later on. Never been to a forum party, but the stalker side of me have seen some of the members at games. Just too afraid to talk to someone, not 100% sure if it is them or not lol.

I like "FeistyFoster." For the record, names with "Pacer" in them seem to all run together.

"Look, it's up to me to put a team around ... Lance right now." —Kevin Pritchard press conference

Re: This Board

Ironically, every single infraction I've gotten was from administering forceful correction to somebody I thought was a troll. There's the Redickulous thread, several run-ins with random Europeans (we referred to them as the Cabbage Patch Kids), and some others I've forgotten.

I'm a pretty mellow guy, but I'm not good at letting idiocy go unchallenged.

Re: This Board

Also I would be remiss without saying that we all owe Able a great deal of thanks, in fact we will never be able to repay him for what he has done (for free I might add). Thanks to Roaming Gnome one time posting photo's of Lucas Oil Stadium before it was open he drew so much traffic here that it actually crashed Able's servers.

I think there was a mega-trade at one point that knocked him offline as well. And the brawl was brutal as well, if I remember correctly.

Poor able had to keep increasing resources for this site. If people realized how much it's cost him over the years, they'd be shocked.